Monogamy: So Much More Than a Hipster Blow-Up

The romanticized commitment-phobia that keeps Judd Apatow in gilt-fixtured man caves is brought down to earth (or Park Slope, anyway) in this inventive indie thriller from Murderball co-director Dana Adam Shapiro.Monogamy follows thirtysomething Brooklynite Theo (Chris Messina) as he simultaneously slogs through his day job as a wedding photographer, preps for his own impending nuptials to perky Nat (Rashida Jones), and works a side gig taking surreptitious shots of clients who contact him anonymously. This latter endeavor leads him to a voluptuous blonde (Meital Dohan) who enjoys public sex and the photographic documentation thereof, and sparks an obsession that threatens Theos love life and overall mental health. While its genre trappings and privileged urban milieu occasionally make Monogamy seem like a glib cocktail of Blow-Up and Look at This Fucking Hipster, they also allow Shapiro to float sly observations on the benignly predatory wedding industry and the subverted misogyny lurking behind affluent males knee-jerk anti-matrimonialism. (He also nails the inarticulate panic and disorienting self-pity of a breakup with nauseatingly perfect pitch.) The films final plot twist is easy to spot well before it arrives, but that doesnt detract from its crafty, heartfelt, and surprisingly sound affirmation of getting hitched.